Startup Village in KCK starting to shrink for obvious reasons now that Google Fiber is available much more broadly around KC and Gigabit is growing nationwide. It won't go away but no longer a standout...

Can anyone link to a story, essay, recollection of the Startup Village experience? Its a fascinating concept, curious to know more. I'm not in Tech and couldn't find a way to utilize the place. I thought the day fees were too high

Gotta wonder how much free streetcar was a factor, outside of course KC's low cost of living..

After a comprehensive evaluation of major markets, AutoAlert said in the release, it selected Kansas City due to its revitalized and growing downtown area, access to tech talent and convenient transportation options.

I'm not exactly sure of their methodology, but looking at the map, it looks like KC had the best "Brain Gain" in the Midwest by a fair margin at 11.3k. Indy at 6.9k, MSP 5.2k, Chicago 4.3k appear to be the next 3. STL and the Ohio cities were all negative numbers. We even had better numbers than Austin and Nashville combined.

The above are tech jobs only. When including other STEM scientific/engineering/tech services jobs, KC has jumped too, around same level as Austin. There are about 100K total Sci/Tech Services jobs in both KC and Austin.

KC is below avg for Venture Capital and a few others. VC is something KC needs to focus on to take startups to next level. Is impressive KC area ranks relatively high with Bachelors+ degrees given no major universities directly in metro. Surprisingly higher than Columbus, which has one of largest schools.

Kansas City and the region surrounding it have gone to great lengths to promote STEM fields and bring new technology companies through coordinated efforts. Currently approximately 94,000 area workers are employed in tech-related jobs with about half of those working in the internet sector. The city has been one of the fastest growing tech scenes of the past decade according to Forbes magazine. And the tech companies, such as Garmin, that have set up shop there and several other companies from the San Francisco Bay area are flocking to the burgeoning tech community, in part due to economic incentives offered by the city and the state of Missouri.

This news is a few weeks old, but I don't think it's been posted here:

Music festival pub FestPop relocating to KC, plans to create 50 jobs

Music festival, travel and news site FestPop is moving its San Diego headquarters to the City of Fountains with big job creation plans.

FestPop plans to create 50 jobs in Kansas City for its platform that helps users plan trips to music festivals and discover music news, said founder and CEO Scotty Moore.

...

Moore, who has family in St. Louis, is moving the firm to access Kansas City’s culture of innovation and talent pool, he said. FestPop is opening a downtown office at 110 W. 9th St. this summer, Moore said.

“Kansas City is a creative, innovative city that’s untapped,” Moore said. “It’s an innovative city that’s a bit off the grid for a lot of people.”